Erin M. Louwagie, Ph.D.
I am a researcher in mechanical engineering fascinated by women’s health and how engineering tools can be used to improve healthcare.
News
September 2025 – CMBBE and iSi Health
It was so inspiring to attend CMBBE and iSi Health’s Summer School and Symposium! It was great to present our work on texture feature extraction from placental ultrasounds at CMBBE, and learn about the future of in silico health at iSi Health!
June 2025 – Workshop and Presentation at SBC2025
This year I had the honor of organizing a workshop on “Women’s Health and Engineering” at the Summer Bioengineering Conference, alongside Daniella Fodera and Abigail Laughlin. I also was thrilled to present our ongoing work to model cesarean section scars!
May 2025 – Poster at IBS2025
I learned so much as an attendee at the Injury Biomechanics Symposium! It was great to share my work and meet other researchers studying injury biomechanics.
April 2025 – Biomedical Engineering Departmental Seminar at Wayne State University
I had a great time presenting my work on computational methods to study pregnancy biomechanics in the BME department seminar at Wayne State University! This presentation highlighted the importance of structure to healthy pregnancy outcomes, especially in the cases of preterm birth, previous cesarean section scars, and fetal growth restriction.
April 2025 – Guest Lecture for Engineering for Women’s Health at Wayne State University
I was honored to have the opportunity to teach Professor Michelle Oyen’s class of engineers on the basics of the cervix and its considerations for research in biomechanics.
March 2025 – Guest Lecture for Reproductive Tissue Engineering at University of Kentucky
Thank you to Professor Samantha Zambuto for inviting me to speak to her reproductive tissue engineering class about the cervix!
December 2024 – Research Featured in Columbia Engineering Magazine
Our work on generating patient-specific computational models was featured in the winter 2025 issue of Columbia Engineering Magazine, in the article “A New Era for Women’s Health Research,” which highlights the amazing work being done by Professors Kristin Myers and Christine Hendon.
November 2024 – Postdoctoral Researcher under Professor Michelle Oyen
I accepted a postdoctoral research position under Michelle Oyen at Wayne State University, and I could not be more thrilled! I’m excited to continue working in women’s health by studying how ultrasound images can be used to predict fetal growth restriction, using finite element models to understand how cesarean section scars can lead to preterm birth, and develop a parametric model of the pregnant anatomy to simulate placental abruption in car crashes.
October 2024 – Ph.D. Conferral
I officially became Dr. Erin M. Louwagie on October 16, receiving my Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Columbia University!
October 2024 – npj Women’s Health Publication
I am very excited about the publication of my newest paper, where we quantified structural features of human pregnancy by assessing maternal reproductive tissues and estimated fetal weight in 47 low-risk pregnancies at four gestational timepoints. Through this work, we have made publicly available ultrasonic dimension measurements of the uterus, cervix, and fetus, cervical stiffness aspiration measurements, and parametric solid models, based on ultrasonic measurements. The article can be found here:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s44294-024-00038-8
June 2024 – Presentation at the University of Minnesota
A big thank you to Professor Kyoko Yoshida, who invited me to present my doctoral research to the biomechanical engineering groups at the University of Minnesota! It was wonderful to catch up, see the Yoshida lab, and share my work.
June 2024 – SB3C Undergraduate Poster Competition
Adriana Delagarza was a finalist in the undergraduate poster competition and did a fantastic job sharing her work on “In Silico Models of In-Vivo Cervical Stiffness Measurements for Improving Preterm Birth Prediction”. So proud!
May 2024 – Thesis Successfully Defended
On May 17, I successfully defended my thesis titled “Development and Implementation of a Parametric Patient-Specific Computational Approach to Study Pregnancy Biomechanics.” I am so proud, and so grateful for all I’ve learned and experienced under Professor Kristin Myers at Columbia!
May 2024 – Research Featured in WSJ
Our work was featured in the Wall Street Journal on May 16, in the article “A ‘Digital Twin’ of Your Heart Lets Doctors Test Treatments Before Surgery“, which included our work on generating patient-specific models of the at-term uterus.
April 2024 – Journal of Biomechanical Engineering Publication
In this paper, we proposed two new parametric methods to model the at-term human uterus: one with numerous detailed measurements of the uterine coronal shape and one with an averaged uterine coronal shape. We compared the two new parametric modeling methods to our previous parametric modeling approach and to models generated from MRI segmentation through computational simulations of uterine pressurization. These approaches make it possible to study a wide range of maternal anatomy in birthing simulation. The article is available here:
https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/biomechanical/article-abstract/146/7/071008/1198709/Parametric-Solid-Models-of-the-At-Term-Uterus-From?redirectedFrom=fulltext
February 2024 – SMFM 2024 Poster
The Society of Maternal-Fetal Medicine Pregnancy Meeting was my first clinical conference, and it was an amazing experience! I learned so much, and presented a poster on our longitudinal study of pregnant maternal anatomy at low-risk for preterm birth.
February 2024 – Emceed Columbia 3MT Competition
It was an honor to return to Columbia’s 3 minute thesis competition, this year as an emcee! Congratulations to all participants and winners!
November 2023 – Featured in Columbia Engineering Thesis Thursday
It was an honor to be the first graduate student highlighted in Columbia’s Thesis Thursday, which showcases the fantastic engineering research being done at Columbia!
July 2023 – USNCCM 2023 Presentation
I enjoyed presenting at the U.S. National Congress on Computational Mechanics, sharing our work exploring the sensitivity of the finite-element models of pregnancy to patient-specific dimension values.
July 2023 – FOETAL2 Workshop @ Oxford
I was thrilled to travel to Oxford to attend the FOETAL2 workshop, organized by our collaborators Professor Antoine Jerusalem and Alice Collier. It was very interesting and I enjoyed presenting on our methods to modeling the at-term uterus.
June 2023 – SB3C 2023 Student Paper Competition Finalist
I was honored to compete in this year’s SB3C student paper competition, presenting on the sensitivity in cervical stretch to varying parametric dimension values in models of the second-trimester uterus and cervix!
April 2023 – SWE EEE Presentation
It’s always a joy to share my love of engineering in women’s health with the next generation, and Columbia’s Society of Women Engineering Exploration Experience was fantastic!
February 2023 – First Place in Columbia 3MT Competition
It was an honor to get first place in Columbia 3 minute thesis competition, where graduate students are challenged to present their research to a general audience in just three minutes. You can watch my presentation on YouTube.
October 2022 – Columbia Undergraduate Research Symposium
Adriana Delagarza presented her summer research at the Columbia Undergraduate Research Symposium. I couldn’t be a prouder research mentor!
September 2022 – VPH 2022 Presentation
The Virtual Physiological Human Conference was very inspiring, and I was lucky enough to present on the effects of fetal membrane adhesion on stretch in the fetal membrane and cervix.
August 2022 – Washington University visit
As we start a new project with our collaborator Professor Michelle Oyen at Washington University, I was fortunate to visit with her and her team and present on our patient-specific modeling methods.
August 2022 – SURE Research Project
I enjoyed having Miccaella Lejwa as my research mentee in the lab this summer as a 2022 SURE Fellow! Her research focused on running computational simulations of maternal anatomy at low risk for preterm birth.
July 2022 – WCB 2022 Poster
I virtually attend the World Congress of Biomechanics to present my poster on the loading of the cervix in patients at low- and high-risk for preterm birth.
July 2022 – ESMC 2022 Presentation and Oxford visit
The European Solid Mechanics Conference was fantastic, and I was fortunate to present our work exploring the sensitivity of the models of pregnant anatomy to changing parametric measurement values. I also had the pleasure of working with our collaborators at Oxford, Professor Antoine Jerusalem and Alice Collier.
June 2022 – SB3C 2022 Presentation
I always enjoy attending SB3C, and this year was no exception! I presented our latest findings in finite element analysis of patients at high- and low-risk for preterm birth and loved watching other lab members present.
April 2022 – NEBEC 2022 Posters
I had a blast attending the Northeast Bioengineering Conference IN-PERSON with my undergraduate mentee, Arielle Feder. We both had poster presentations presenting how our patient-specific modeling framework could be used to explore pregnancy biomechanics.
September 2021 – CMBBE 2021 Presentation
I virtually attended the 17th International Symposium on Computer Methods in Biomechanics and Biomedical Engineering, where I presented on observed differences in loading of maternal reproductive tissues in patients who did and did not deliver at term, found using our finite element models.
August 2021 – SURE Research Project
I loved having Jada Hinds, a 2021 SURE Fellow from Duke University, as a research mentee in the lab over the summer! You can watch her present her work on studying the effects of maternal anatomy parameters on cervical loading at the Columbia SURE website.
July 2021 – USNCCM 2021 Presentation
I virtually attended the U.S. National Congress on Computational Mechanics and presented our latest findings on the loading of the pregnant uterus and cervix in our finite element models.
June 2021 – SB3C 2021 Presentation
I presented at SB3C 2021, giving an update on our modeling of low-risk for preterm birth maternal geometries. Also, an undergrad whom I mentor, Arielle Feder, got runner-up in the BS level student paper competition!
March 2021 – WISC STEMinar
I had the chance to geek out about my favorite advances in women’s health made by engineers! Geared towards middle school and high school students, it can be watched on YouTube.
January 2021 – PLOS One publication
My paper on longitudinal dimension measurements of the uterus and cervix from ultrasound and automatically generating patient specific models from them has been published! Check it out here:
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0242118
September 2020 – Summer Undergraduate Individual Project Presentation
So unbelievably proud of the undergraduate students I advised this summer, Divya Rajasekharan, Arielle Feder, and Anabella Advincula! They recently finished their summer projects and recorded their end-of-summer progress videos. Divya and Arielle’s videos were uploaded to Columbia Academic Commons, and Anabella’s was featured on the Myers Lab Website!
June 2020 – SB3C Virtual Conference
I had such a great time attending the SB3C virtual conference and recording a lightning talk! My lightning talk on a new patient-specific modeling method is available to watch through Columbia Academic Commons: https://academiccommons.columbia.edu/doi/10.7916/d8-wxem-e863
April 2020 – Honorable Mention for NSF GRFP and NIH IMAG-AND Poster Competition
I am so proud to say that I received an honorable mention for my NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program application (you can find me by searching the NSF GRFP website here)! I also received an honorable mention in the NIH Interagency Modeling and Analysis Group – Amplifying Impact by Nuturing Diversity Futures Trainee Poster Competition! My poster can be viewed through the 2020 IMAG-AND wiki.
February 2020 – Erin Louwagie, M.S.
So proud to have earned my Master’s of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Columbia University!
August 2019 – CMBBE @ Columbia
It was a blast giving my first conference presentation right on my own campus! I presented on computational models of patients at high-risk for preterm birth. The boat cruise around Manhattan was the cherry on top!
May 2019 – Passed the Qualifying Exam!
After a month of non-stop studying, it feels so good to say that I passed my qualifying exam and am now OFFICIALLY a doctoral candidate in Mechanical Engineering at Columbia!
April 2019 – Member of Myers Soft Tissue Lab
After doing lab rotation during my first year of graduate school, I have decided to continue my research in Professor Kristin’s Myers Lab! I will be working on developing patient-specific models of reproductive organs from 2D ultrasound! You can check out my Myers Lab Member Bio here!
March 2019 – Analytical Methods Publication
I am second author on a recently published paper on improved detection of Strep using the thermal contrast amplification reader! The paper can be found here:
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2019/ay/c8ay02125b#!divAbstract
January 2019 – Rotation in Myers Soft Tissue Lab
With the new semester, I will rotate in Professor Kristin Myers lab! I’m so excited to explore research opportunities in her lab on the biomechanics of pregnancy!
December 2018 – End of Rotation in Kasza Living Materials Lab
The end of the semester also means an end to my rotation in the Kasza Living Materials Lab, and what an amazing rotation it was! I learned so much about cell crawling, optogenetics, and taking care of Drosophila! I gave my exit out presentation on investigating cell crawling, and am so glad to have made so many good friends and memories!
September 2018 – Starting Graduate School at Columbia in the Kasza Living Materials Lab as a Blavatnik Fellow
As I begin as an M.S./Ph.D. student in Mechanical Engineering at Columbia University, I’m so glad to have the opportunity to spend my first year doing a rotation between the labs of Professors Karen Kasza and Kristin Myers. I’m starting in the Kasza Living Materials Lab, and was officially named a Blavatnik Doctoral Fellow! I am so grateful for this award!
May 2018 – Columbia University Presidential Fellow
I am proud to announce that I will be attending graduate school this fall at Columbia University in Mechanical Engineering on their M.S./Ph.D. track, and will be entering as Presidential Fellow! I’m so excited and honored!
June 2017 – Third Place in 2017 SB3C Student Paper Competition!
It was so cool to attend the SB3C conference this year in Tuscon, Arizona and present my poster on improving strep throat detection using the TCA reader! It was also cool to get Third Place in my section, Human Dynamics and Injury, Devices, and Imaging!
Erin M. Louwagie, Ph.D. 